Israel's government faced calls for a cease-fire from some of its closest European allies on Sunday after a series of shootings, including the mistaken killing of three Israeli hostages, fueled global concerns about the conduct of the 10-week-old war in Gaza.
Israeli protesters are urging their government to renew negotiations with Gaza's Hamas rulers, whom Israel has vowed to destroy. Israel is also expected to face pressure to scale back major combat operations when U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visits Monday. Washington is expressing growing unease with civilian casualties even as it provides vital military and diplomatic support.
The war has flattened large parts of northern Gaza, killed thousands of civilians and driven most of the population to the southern part of the besieged territory, where many are in crowded shelters and tent camps. Some 1.9 million Palestinians -- about 90 per cent of Gaza's population -- have fled their homes.
They survive off a trickle of humanitarian aid. Dozens of desperate Palestinians surrounded aid trucks after they drove in through the Rafah crossing with Egypt, forcing some to stop before climbing aboard, pulling down boxes and carrying them off. Other trucks appeared to be guarded by masked people carrying sticks.
Israel said aid passed directly from Israel into Gaza for the first time Sunday, with 79 trucks entering from Kerem Shalom, where around 500 trucks entered daily before the war. Another 120 trucks entered via Rafah along with six trucks carrying fuel or cooking gas, said Wael Abu Omar, Palestinian Crossings Authority spokesman.
Aid workers say it's still far from enough. "You cannot deliver aid under a sky full of airstrikes," a spokesperson with the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, Juliette Touma, said on social media, while the agency estimated that more than 60 per cent of Gaza's infrastructure had been destroyed in the war.
Telecom services in Gaza gradually resumed after a four-day communications blackout, the longest of several outages during the war that groups say complicate rescue and delivery efforts.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel "will continue to fight until the end," with the goal of eliminating Hamas, which triggered the war with its Oct. 7 attack into southern Israel. Palestinian militants killed some 1,200 people that day, mostly civilians, and captured scores of hostages.
Netanyahu has vowed to bring back the estimated 129 hostages still in captivity. Anger over the mistaken killing of hostages is likely to increase pressure on him to renew Qatar-mediated negotiations with Hamas over swapping more of the remaining captives for Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.
Meanwhile, Israel has been defensively striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, said Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson. The group has ramped up attacks against Israel, he added, killing civilians and soldiers and displacing more than 80,000 Israelis from their homes.
"Hezbollah -- a proxy of Iran -- is dragging Lebanon into an unnecessary war that would have devastating consequences for the people of Lebanon," Hagari said in a statement. "This is a war that they do not deserve."
Hagari said Israel will continue to protect its borders "until and unless a diplomatic solution is found and implemented."
In Israel on Sunday, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna called for an "immediate truce" aimed at releasing more hostages, getting larger amounts of aid into Gaza and moving toward "the beginning of a political solution."
France's Foreign Ministry earlier said an employee was killed in an Israeli strike on a home in Rafah on Wednesday. It condemned the strike, which it said killed several civilians, and demanded clarification from Israeli authorities.
The foreign ministers of the U.K. and Germany, meanwhile, called for a "sustainable" cease-fire, saying too many civilians have been killed.
"Israel will not win this war if its operations destroy the prospect of peaceful co-existence with Palestinians," British Foreign Secretary David Cameron and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock wrote in the U.K.'s Sunday Times.
The U.S. defense secretary is set to travel to Israel to continue discussions on a timetable for ending the war's most intense phase. Israeli and U.S. officials have spoken of a transition to more targeted strikes aimed at killing Hamas leaders and rescuing hostages, without saying when it would occur.
Hamas has said no more hostages will be released until the war ends, and that in exchange it will demand the release of large numbers of Palestinian prisoners, including high-profile militants.
Hamas released over 100 of more than 240 hostages captured on Oct. 7 in exchange for the release of scores of Palestinian prisoners during a brief cease-fire in November. Nearly all freed on both sides were women and minors. Israel has rescued one hostage.
The Israeli military said Sunday it had discovered a large tunnel in Gaza close to what was once a busy crossing into Israel, raising new questions about how Israeli surveillance missed such conspicuous attack preparations by Hamas.
Military officials said Saturday that the three hostages who were mistakenly shot by Israeli troops had tried to signal that they posed no harm. It was Israel's first such acknowledgement of harming hostages in the war.
The hostages, all in their 20s, were killed Friday in the Gaza City area of Shijaiyah, where troops are engaged in fierce fighting with Hamas. An Israeli military official said the shootings were against the army's rules of engagement and were being investigated at the highest level.
Israel says it makes every effort to avoid harming civilians and accuses Hamas of using them as human shields. But Palestinians and rights groups have repeatedly accused Israeli forces of recklessly endangering civilians and firing on those who do not threaten them, both in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, which has seen a surge of violence since the war began.
A shell struck the pediatric ward of a hospital in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza late Sunday, killing a girl, said Dr. Mohammed Abu Lihia, who works in the emergency department.
Footage shared by Gaza's Health Ministry showed a burst ceiling and wall in the Mubarak Hospital for Children and Maternity in the Nasser Hospital complex with bloodstains near children's cots and cribs on the third floor.
The doctor said he helped three others, two older adults and a child, escape the hospital. A videographer filming for The Associated Press said at least 5 people, including children, were wounded. The Israeli military didn't immediately comment.
Israel continues to strike positions across Khan Younis. Palestinians from the north fled there in the early weeks of the conflict.
Also Sunday, five people were killed and many injured after a reported Israeli airstrike hit near a U.N.-run school in Khan Younis where displaced Palestinians were sheltering. A cameraman with AP counted five bodies delivered to a hospital.
The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said two Christian women at a church compound in Gaza were killed by Israeli sniper fire.
Pope Francis called Sunday for peace, saying "unarmed civilians are being bombed and shot at, and this has even happened inside the Holy Family parish complex, where there are no terrorists but families, children and sick people with disabilities, nuns."
In discussions Saturday between the Israeli military and representatives of the church community, no one reported a strike on the church or civilians being wounded or killed, the military said. It said a review of its initial investigation had supported that.
The offensive has killed more than 18,700 Palestinians, the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run territory said Thursday in its last update before the communications blackout. It has said that thousands more casualties are buried under the rubble. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths, but has said that most of those killed were women and children.
The plight of Palestinian civilians has gotten little attention inside Israel, where many are still deeply traumatized by the Oct. 7 attack and where support for the war remains strong.
Israel's military says 121 of its soldiers have been killed in the Gaza offensive. It says it has killed thousands of militants, without providing evidence.
------
Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writers Tia Goldenberg in Tel Aviv, Israel, and Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut, Lebanon, contributed to this report.
Just days before the seventh anniversary of the day Jack Letts was thrown in prison with thousands of suspected ISIS fighters, his mother, Sally Lane, delivered a small stack of envelopes to the headquarters of Global Affairs Canada in Ottawa.
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
In an effort to balance the profitability of Mother's Day with the pain it causes some people, some brands are offering customers the choice to opt out of Mother's Day email advertising.
The makers of Ozempic say their weight-loss drug Wegovy will be available to patients in Canada starting Monday.
Citizens' Services Minister Terry Beech says 1,200 seniors have already visited a dentist and had their claims processed by the federal government's new dental care plan.
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall Plexiglass barriers.
Scientists studying a Neanderthal woman's remains have painstakingly pieced together her skull from 200 bone fragments to understand what she may have looked like.
Victims of a Brantford, Ont., woman who was sentenced to house arrest earlier this year for defrauding and deceiving doulas say they’re not surprised she’s been apprehended again on similar charges.
Liberal MP Pam Damoff says she won't run again in the next federal election, saying she has experienced misogyny, disrespectful dialogue in politics and threats to her life.
A suspect in a fatal shooting in Toronto’s east end last summer has been arrested in Charlottetown, just one week after he topped a list of Canada’s most wanted fugitives.
As protestors set up tent encampments at universities across Canada and the U.S.in support of Palestine, London, Ont.’s Western University finds itself no exception on Wednesday.
A judge has rejected a request from two McGill University students for a court injunction to limit where protesters can go on campus.
Dozens of London Drugs stores in Western Canada remained closed for the fourth straight day following a "cybersecurity incident," but some services returned Wednesday.
Defence lawyers told court they will argue alleged serial killer Jeremy Skibicki is not criminally responsible for the deaths of four Indigenous women by way of a mental disorder.
Victims of a Brantford, Ont., woman who was sentenced to house arrest earlier this year for defrauding and deceiving doulas say they’re not surprised she’s been apprehended again on similar charges.
A section of a highway collapsed after heavy rains in southern China, sending cars tumbling down a slope and leaving at least 36 people dead, authorities said Thursday.
Administrators and campus police at UCLA faced intense criticism Wednesday for failing to act quickly to stop an attack on a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus by counter-demonstrators who threw traffic cones and chairs, released pepper spray and tore down barriers.
Police shot and killed a Wisconsin student outside a middle school after receiving a report of someone with a weapon while class was in session Wednesday.
The Arizona legislature approved a repeal of a long-dormant ban on nearly all abortions Wednesday, sending the bill to Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, who is expected to sign it.
Colombia says it will break diplomatic relations with Israel on Thursday over its actions in Gaza.
Prosecutors asked for a September retrial for Harvey Weinstein during a hearing Wednesday in Manhattan, the disgraced movie mogul's first court appearance since his 2020 rape conviction was overturned by an appeals court last week.
Just days before the seventh anniversary of the day Jack Letts was thrown in prison with thousands of suspected ISIS fighters, his mother, Sally Lane, delivered a small stack of envelopes to the headquarters of Global Affairs Canada in Ottawa.
Shovels have hit the ground for constuction on Canada's LGBTQ2S+ national monument in Ottawa.
An unrepentant Pierre Poilievre returned to the House of Commons on Wednesday to pepper the prime minister about his drug decriminalization policies after being booted the day prior for refusing to take back calling Justin Trudeau 'wacko' over his approach to the issue.
Nearly a month after the total solar eclipse, at least 160 cases of eye damage have been reported across the country.
The highly contagious norovirus is spreading across Canada, with some symptoms overlapping with other viruses. CTVNews.ca spoke with a health expert to find out how you can tell you have norovirus, the most common form of stomach flu, and what to do if you have it.
The number of young people experiencing eating disorders surged during the height of the pandemic as the social and economic costs skyrocketed too, a new pan-Canadian report has found.
Scientists studying a Neanderthal woman's remains have painstakingly pieced together her skull from 200 bone fragments to understand what she may have looked like.
In a first-of-its-kind case, a B.C. tribunal has ruled on a dispute involving the non-consensual sharing of intimate images, awarding damages and issuing orders that the photos be destroyed and taken offline.
A wealthy Silicon Valley-backed campaign to build a green city for up to 400,000 people in the San Francisco Bay Area has submitted what it says are enough signatures to qualify the initiative for the November election.
Pop superstar Dua Lipa is preparing to pull double duty as this week's 'Saturday Night Live' host and musical guest, with a little help from cast member Chloe Fineman.
The career of the Godfather of Canadian Hip-Hop, aka Maestro Fresh Wes, is getting its close-up in a new exhibition that opens May 15 at the National Music Centre.
Melissa McCarthy was completely unbothered by a comment Barbra Streisand left on her Instagram in which the legendary singer asked the Oscar-nominated actress if she was on Ozempic. In fact, she took it as a compliment.
Employees at Canada's two biggest railways have authorized a strike that could see thousands of workers walk off the job in three weeks if they are unable to reach new deals on contract demands.
Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem says he doesn't think the federal budget tabled last month will have much of an effect on inflation.
Plans to use a renovated cruise ship to house more than 600 workers as they build a liquefied natural gas facility near Squamish, B.C., have been voted down by the local council.
Have you ever wanted to rekindle an old friendship, but stopped short of actually reaching out?
A month after eight Norwegian Cruise Line passengers were stranded in Africa when their ship left without them because they were late getting back, a U.S. couple – ages 84 and 81 – were also left behind by the cruise line in Spain.
In an effort to balance the profitability of Mother's Day with the pain it causes some people, some brands are offering customers the choice to opt out of Mother's Day email advertising.
The Edmonton Oilers and Los Angeles Kings played a tight-checking series at even strength. But the special teams matchup was lopsided - and that's why it ended in five games.
Tampa Bay Lightning coach Jon Cooper apologized for making what he called an inappropriate analogy of putting skirts on goalies.
Oilers forward Zach Hyman hoping to teach 'Shaq Hyman' how to skate: 'For free'
Drivers in Saskatchewan will now lose their licence for a week and their vehicle for a month if they are caught committing certain high-speed and dangerous offences on the road.
Rolls-Royce is vastly expanding its factory in Chichester, England. The BMW subsidiary is adding five new buildings with construction planned to start next year.
On a three-lane test track along the Monongahela River, an 18-wheel tractor-trailer rounded a curve. No one was on board.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.
Police in Oak Bay, B.C., had to close a stretch of road Sunday to help an elephant seal named Emerson get safely back into the water.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
Raneem, 10, lives with a neurological condition and liver disease and needs Cholbam, a medication, for a longer and healthier life.
The lawyer for a residential school survivor leading a proposed class-action defamation lawsuit against the Catholic Church over residential schools says the court action is a last resort.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
As of May 1, the new federally-run Canadian Dental Care Plan provides coverage for nearly two million low-income seniors. But finding a provider in B.C. could be tough.
The taps have been turned on for the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion – a national infrastructure project that overcame fierce public opposition, construction delays and cost-overruns that pushed the final bill to more than $34 billion.
Every provincial employee is receiving emails or memos directing them to change their passwords immediately, CTV News has learned.
A Canadian restaurant lowered its prices this week, and though news of price tags dropping rather than climbing sounds unusual, the business strategy in this case is not, according to experts in the field.
As multiple Durham police cruisers were chasing a robbery suspect on the wrong side of Highway 401 Monday night, an Ontario Provincial Police officer shared his concerns, telling a dispatcher, "Someone's going to get hurt."
The trusted traveler program between Canada and the United States is extremely popular and almost two million Canadians have a Nexus card.
An Okotoks, Alta., man was rushed to hospital on Wednesday afternoon, believed to have been shot in his own home.
High River RCMP are calling for increased highway awareness after an officer conducting a traffic stop on Highway 2 narrowly escaped being struck by a truck.
A day after Calgary's mayor called the Alberta government's decision to pull its funding for the low-income transit pass program "cruel," the province is reversing its decision.
Starting in September, public servants in the core public administration will be required to work in the office a minimum of three days a week. The Treasury Board Secretariat says executives will need to be in the office four days per week.
Two Ottawa non-profits, both serving the autism community, have suddenly closed their doors within the past week, leaving parents with fewer supports in the city.
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall Plexiglass barriers.
A judge has rejected a request from two McGill University students for a court injunction to limit where protesters can go on campus.
Quebec film giants Denis Villeneuve and Patrick Huard are getting special honours at this year's Canadian Screen Awards.
Montreal police were called to investigate two stabbings early Wednesday evening in Rosemont-La-Petite Patrie and Cote-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grace.
A man is in life-threatening condition after a Wednesday afternoon stabbing in Edmonton's core.
Edmonton Fire Rescue Services (EFRS) announced Wednesday morning Joe Zatylny will step down as its chief on May 10.
At this time last year, e-scooters had been patrolling Edmonton streets for almost a month. This year, they have yet to make their debut -- and likely won't until the end of this month at the earliest.
For the next month, thousands of shoppers from across the country plan to get their groceries anywhere other than Loblaws-owned stores. The move is an attempt to get the box chain to lower its prices, as frustration grows over the high price of food.
Local police say officers arrested Michael Bebee, the most wanted fugitive in Canada, in Charlottetown, P.E.I., Tuesday night.
Investigators from the Transportation Safety Board of Canada were in St. John's, N.L., Wednesday after a plane overshot the main runway at the city's airport.
A motion before Winnipeg’s public works committee could make it easier for shoppers who stocked up on bulk packs of toilet paper and chicken breast to exit one of the city’s bustling Costco locations.
More than a dozen people are facing charges, the majority Winnipeggers, after an interprovincial drug bust that turned up millions of dollars in cash, drugs, guns, jewelry and luxury vehicles.
Defence lawyers told court they will argue alleged serial killer Jeremy Skibicki is not criminally responsible for the deaths of four Indigenous women by way of a mental disorder.
Sask. families who are required to travel outside of the province to access medical care for their children will receive financial support.
A former campground in Regina will be turned into an Indigenous ceremony site.
Weyburn RCMP say no one was injured in a single-vehicle semi rollover on Highway 18 near Beaubier, but the crash did force the closure of Highway 18.
Waterloo regional police are looking for the person who shot into the window of a Waterloo business.
Victims of a Brantford, Ont., woman who was sentenced to house arrest earlier this year for defrauding and deceiving doulas say they’re not surprised she’s been apprehended again on similar charges.
Hollywood heavyweight Arnold Schwarzenegger has caused quite a stir in a small Ontario town this week.
A Saskatchewan family won the bovine lottery after their cow gave birth to a rare set of quadruplets.
Saskatchewan employers will be required to tell new hires if they face a risk of violence in the workplace and to take actions against it starting on May 17.
Police officers and cadaver dogs have begun searching the Saskatoon landfill for answers in the Mackenzie Lee Trottier case.
Police in Sault Ste. Marie are investigating two sudden deaths on Boundary Road.
The remains of a 44-year-old person were found Tuesday morning on Delamere Road in French River, Ontario Provincial Police said.
French River officials say they’re hopeful things will start to improve now and that they’ve turned a corner from the high water levels on Lake Nipissing, the French River and other waterways going through their municipality.
A city councillor wants free rides on London Transit on a Sunday this fall, and urges colleagues to pursue no-fare transit in the future.
Residents who live in the Hyde Park Place apartments in north London, Ont. said they are heartbroken after Old Oak Properties removed two geese nests, containing more than half a dozen eggs.
Ontario's Ministry of the Environment has ordered a petrochemical facility in Sarnia to suspend its production operations after high benzene emissions, first flagged by a neighbouring First Nation.
The man who police say killed Katherine Janeiro and left her body for friends to find, Robert MacQueen aka Bruce Ellis will stand trial for her murder.
A Barrie woman was all smiles after taking home a big lottery win to her husband.
Residents in a Barrie neighbourhood are being asked to check their property for suspicious substances or weapons.
One person has died after a crash near Leamington between a vehicle and a motorcycle. First responders were called to the scene Wednesday night in the area of Mersea Road 2 and Mersea Road 19.
The City of Windsor has filed its statement of defence following a wrongful dismissal lawsuit filed by a former senior employee.
As pro-Palestinian protestors set up encampments at colleges and universities across Canada and the United States, a like-minded organizer in Windsor said Wednesday her group had no plans to follow suit.
A pro-Palestinian protest camp has formed at the University of Victoria in solidarity with the people of Gaza and with similar encampments that have sprung up on university and college campuses in opposition to the Israel-Hamas war.
Shauna Owens-Krahn lives on Bear Mountain in Langford. Four times a day she takes her dogs for walks through the trails near her home and carries bear spray, just in case.
Every provincial employee is receiving emails or memos directing them to change their passwords immediately, CTV News has learned.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
An emaciated dachshund is now recovering thanks to a Good Samaritan who found the pup near a biking trail in Kelowna, according to the BC SPCA.
Search and rescue crews have been called in after a vehicle belonging to a missing senior was located near a rural intersection outside of Kelowna Tuesday.
Volunteers with ‘The Watch’ program in Lethbridge have been patrolling the city centre rain or shine for five years.
A Transportation Safety Board report says experience, recent training and safety equipment were key factors in a pilot surviving the crash of a firefighting plane south of Cranbrook in August 2022.
Facing a Tuesday night elimination game, Caelan Fitzpatrick responded with a hat trick to lead the Brooks Bandits past the Okotoks Oilers 5-1.
The City of Sault Ste. Marie will soon be charging owners of vacant properties a special tax.
A group of Sault Ste. Marie YMCA supporters working to save the facility from closure received a glimmer of hope at this week’s city council meeting.
Another incident at Algoma Steel has union officials questioning safety protocols at Sault Ste. Marie’s steel plant.
Richard Martin is spending this year's fishing season on land after he says a Royal Newfoundland Constabulary officer broke his left leg in three places during a protest last month that shut down the provincial legislature.
Tributes continue to pour in for Bob Cole as his family has confirmed a funeral will be held for the legendary broadcaster Friday in St. John's, N.L.
Legendary sportscaster Bob Cole was a Newfoundlander through and through, and his daughter says his connection to the province was 'everything' to him.
The Shopping Trends team is independent of the journalists at CTV News. We may earn a commission when you use our links to shop. Read about us.
